There is an invisible side to grief that I think a lot of people don’t realize. A complicated, tightrope walk that is happening beneath the facade of those making their way through their personal journey with loss. It might be easy to nod and say, of course there is this layer, it makes sense that healing is a process and a that there will be ups and downs, but the reality of the rollercoaster is far more complex, far more tenuous than might be imagined.

Today, the owl house got hung. The owls are what James and I thought might remind me of him; we thought they might be something that might provide me with a sense that he was still here in some way, a comfort from nature. Having an owl house that he built and gave to me only solidified that concept and made the hanging of it carry far more weight than just providing a habitat for some amazing raptors. After a lot of research, I had decided to place the house in a tree that overlooks the pasture. An ideal spot for barred owls where they prefer to look east, out over a clearing of some sort with easy entry into their homes, but far more than that, it felt symbolic, a way to imagine James himself looking out over his beloved pasture with the morning sun warming his face.

The arborist I had hired through the recommendations of colleagues could not have been better suited for the task. While this was the first owl house he had hung, he was as excited and eager for the project as I was, and handled the entire event as far more than a professional task to be accomplished, but with a gentleness of spirit that acknowledged all that it meant to me. We weren’t sure how it was going to go, there were unknowns and challenges that we anticipated, but it went up perfectly and without a single hitch. At least not a hitch that anyone else might have felt or experienced.

For me, the entire process, from the start of my quest to get it hung to standing back and admiring the success of the house up in the tree, had not only a weight to the task, but it was an emotional dam being held back by extremely tenuous threads. But there were things to be done and people around and so, like most times, that journey through those emotions has to wait, has to be pushed back and dealt with at some other time. The appearance to the world is that this was fine, this was maybe not easy but that it wasn’t debilitating.

My to do list carried me from the edge of the pasture to the garden to water, where the first ripe strawberry of the season awaited me. Fellow gardners can relate, each “first” each season brings a delight to the senses that reminds you why you work so hard in the dirt to begin with. I have been hauling water for weeks now, and so the berry wasn’t just the normal celebration of another bounty headed my way, but was tangible evidence that I was being successful, in some small way, even if I wasn’t doing it James’ way, even if Mother Nature wasn’t cooperating, I was doing it. But I didn’t even pick the berry, I let it stay on the plant for another day, as I wasn’t quite ready to step through all the emotions that signified to me.

From the garden, I headed out to solve a tractor issue. A loaded quest for sure, taking me far out of my normal realm of tasks this time, I had the deeply appreciated patience of a man at the tractor dealer who explained everything to me as though he could visibly see my emotional dam about to break. With my current issue solved and future concerns allieviated, I left the store feeling successful and proud, but the moment I saw down in the driver’s seat, the emotional dam burst and I cried and cried.

For me, these emotions are always and I mean always right under the surface. I know that will lessen and soften with time, but this road I am on makes every single step feel like I’m walking in a minefield. For the sake of the world, I try to hold it together, keep those emotions at bay, appear normal even, but it’s exhausting and it’s constant and the weight of all of that brings me to my knees behind closed doors – even just car doors – more times that anyone might imagine.

So maybe it shouldn’t have been a surprise when later in the afternoon, an argument erupted. An argument that I had been trying to navigate around, trying to escape, trying to diffuse but without success. There is too much bottled up to survive the last straw. There is too much to explain to make it make sense to anyone else- in fact just the fact that I have to explain it at all makes his absence grow. He would understand what I feel and what I mean and what I need.

I am surrounded by people who love me and care about me – people who are also grieving his loss. But I do not think even they understand this journey. People want to help, they want to support, they want to be there for me, but they can’t understand all the triggers, they can’t understand the weight of those triggers or the fear that I will publically lose my shit, or the desire to not release the dam of emotion in harmful or damaging or unintentional ways. They can’t understand how much I have to do on my own to prove to myself that I can. They don’t understand. This journey is a solo one. No matter how close my support network is, each one of us walks this path alone.

I don’t share any of this for pity or even in apology to those I hurt with my words today. I just mean to share a side of grief that is unseen, unfelt, unknown to those outside this path. Learning to manage these emotions isn’t something I do for my own well-being, it’s for the people around me. I know I have to let the emotions out, I have to process, I have to work through and not around, but I cannot do that in the presence of others. I cannot explain, I cannot make anyone understand, I cannot scare the general public with the strength and fury of these things inside me. I am angry. I am in pain. I am so very broken but I have to be strong, I have to stand up and move one foot in front of the other, I have to carry on even -and often- when I do not want to carry on at all. The world may well recognize that I’m not walking through a field of daisies right now, but I do not know that it can feel the tremors of the landmines, either. It does not know how scary it is to set each foot down. People cannot see how tightly my teeth are clenched or how hard it is to stand still and smile when you know you’re standing right on top of an explosive trigger.

I do not know if owls will ever reside in the house he built for me. It’s too late this year, and there are so many other creatures that may wish to call it home for a season. I hope some day they do, but it is enough, today, to know that James and I together have provided a place for such magnificent bird to call home. In this new world without him, he and I still did that together today. And the strawberries we planted together continue to flourish. And the tractor he loved continues to bless me with all it can do around here. We are still in this together, he is still helping me move forward. There is joy in all of that, for sure. But it is not without deep, unabating pain right now. Every single thing is filled with his absence. Including, and especially, me.

I had just stepped out of my car and taken about three steps toward the hospital on my way to an orthopedic appointment. I was a bit started when she spoke to me. She looked vaguely familiar; I want to even say she had a bohemian look about her, although there is absolutely nothing in my recollection now that points to anything specifically so. In the way she approached me, I thought she was going to ask me for directions, and I was already rehearsing my response knowing how bad I am with directions anywhere.

“Excuse me,” she said, “but I am a reader of license plates and I wondered if you could explain yours to me?” The question caught me completely off guard, but immediately conjured the explanation that was going to tug at my heart more than I felt prepared to deal with standing in front of a stranger in a parking garage.

“Someday Farm,” I said, “It means ‘Someday Farm’. It’s what we call our farm,” I went on, the pronoun sticking in my throat like it does every time I say, “we” anymore. She didn’t say a word as we both kept walking toward the building, but her demeanor somehow prompted to me to keep talking, a rarity with people I don’t know. “We always said, ‘Someday we’ll get cows, someday we’ll get chickens…’ so we named our farm, ‘Someday Farm.’” By this point we were nearly to the doors of the hospital and I looked to the outside stairs leading up to the floor I needed to get to as an escape hatch, but she stopped and faced me and asked one more heartwrenching question before I could retreat to the stairs, “Do you still have all those animals?”

I stared at her. Later, I would wonder why that was the question she asked. Why didn’t she ask if we ever got those animals? What prompted her to think we wouldn’t still be living that dream? “No,” I finally quietly replied. “My husband recently passed away and so we had to get rid of the cows…” my voice trailing off as I tried to suffocate the feelings of anger and loss and grief quickly rising up in my chest.

“I am so sorry,” she said, and looking at her, it was as though the same feelings were rising up in her. She truly was sorry. I’m not sure I have ever met anyone who so clearly fit the term “empath,” but she definitely is one. “I don’t even know you,” she continued, “but I feel like I should hug you,” she said.And in a move I cannot begin to explain, I took a step forward and hugged her. Which I never do. Especially to a stranger.

We parted ways, me making a quick escape up the stairs and I continued on to my appointment. The encounter had been unsettling and yet I didn’t feel unsettled. She felt like a friend, she seemed familiar, it had seemed so honest and true and real.After my appointment, having all but temporarily forgotten about the previous encounter as my mind raced toward my next dreaded appointment at the dermatologist (dreaded only because of the reminder of why he was gone, not that I had any particular concerns for myself), I got to my car and had just turned the key when she approached from a few cars away. I immediately thought how odd it was that we had both finished our appointments at the same time, but then I realized she was talking to me and I put my window down and heard her say, “I was just going to leave this on your windshield,” as she handed me an envelope, and then, “and this sucker,” and she handed me a red Tootsie Pop. I didn’t know what to say or do. I don’t know what I said or did. She walked away, I put my window back up and I sat in my car and let the tears roll. It took several long minutes before I even opened the envelope. Several very long moments.

“Dear Ms. Someday Farm,” the card read, “It was nice meeting you today. I am soo sorry to hear about your husband. How painful. I have this weird thing where sometimes it seems like God uses license plates to whisper to me – this morning he used yours. Through you, I needed the “someday” reminder. Someday = at some time in the future – one day, by + by in the fulness of time.” I flipped the card to the back and continued reading, “I go to the River Church and have great hope that Paradise is our future for those who reach out to Jesus! Someday is coming.”Inside the card was her business card, including her name, telephone number and email. The back of the business card carried this message:

I haven’t heard the owls since the day James’ died. I have begged for him to talk to me. I have cried on my knees on the floor asking him to just let me know he is okay, wherever he might be. I have sat on the porch steps at the tail end of dusk, like he and I used to do together, and I have listened and cried and spoken to him. “Talk to me!” I plead. “Talk to me! Tell me you are okay!” Just this morning a wood thrush sang it’s two-phrase ditty outside my bedroom window over and over on repeat until I thought I would go mad. Even then, I voiced out loud, “Is that you? Are you trying to talk to me?”

Later, after all my appointments had been survived for the day, I invited my sister over to sit on the porch and talk. I had briefly texted her about my initial encounter with the woman, but now, seated side by side, I handed her the card and waited for her response. “Am I crazy?” I asked when she finished reading the words.

“No,” she said, without requiring any further explanation on my part. “This is a sign, for sure.”

Today, a stranger that felt familiar literally handed me the words I needed to hear. She literally handed them to me. I have heard people say before that faith in a higher power is something people do to provide an explanation to the unexplainable. It’s a crutch people lean on to give themselves comfort. But my life story has shown me that faith is hard. It is not something easy to lean on or lean into, it is an enormous leap without tangible evidence.

“…have great hope that Paradise is our future for those who reach out to Jesus! Someday is coming.”

My grief threatens to consume me most days. I struggle every moment of every day to keep it at bay long enough to do the things I am required to do – hour by hour, minute by minute. This place, this farm, this was our Eden, this was our Heaven. But today, at least for a moment, I could set my sights ahead and think “our Someday has yet to come.”

After all, red Tootsie Pops are my favorite.

Someday is coming.

I wrote it eighteen months ago. During my annual writing in November, when I participate in National Novel Writing Month, I wrote my second children’s chapter book. James listened as I struggled to get words typed each night. He asked regularly about my current word count and he even helped me map out the storyline one night at our kitchen counter, so that I could see my way through to the ending that already existed in my mind. When the very rough draft was completed, he asked for his own copy and he took it to work in a binder to read on his own.

For one reason or another, not all ones I can articulate well, I decided to read this draft to my class this spring. What started with instructional intentions – a desire at least to show revision and editing once again with my own work – has become a favorite part of the day for author and audience alike. Reading my words out loud to an actual audience of children has been heartwarming and rewarding in ways I didn’t even expect. Just yesterday, while reading a particularly harrowing chapter of events, a student sitting on the floor to my right kept gasping. It was an appropriate reaction to the text, but it took my own breath away knowing she felt that moved by my roughed-in words and descriptions. The students, for their part, are a very enthusiastic set of guinea pigs, willing to listen and give advice and ask questions. They have caught inconsistencies, they have recommended changes and they have showered me with more praise for the storyline than I fear is earned on its own merits.

The story itself includes bits of me in some ways and bits of who I wanted to be as a child in others. With parallel storylines of a ten year old girl and a sea turtle, I tried to share how we all navigate ourselves through some rather cliché rites of passage – the loss of a parent, the weight of decisions and the challenges of friendship.

This morning, as a mostly brain-free activity after finishing standardized testing, we gathered on the rug at the front of the room to once again dive into my story. I named the paired parallel chapters with what my students have come to refer to as, “VCW’s” or “Very Cool Words.” (One of the class’ very astute suggestions was that I provide a kid-friendly definition for each chapter title as some words are beyond the scope of fourth-grade vocabulary.) Today’s chapter was the second in the pairing, with the sea turtle’s side of a situation titled, “Opportunity.” The sea turtle, named Finn, had weathered a storm with her best friend in the previous chapter, coming out on the other side of the tumultuous weather event to find that her friend, a fish named Bumper, was now missing.

It has amazed and surprised the students that despite the fact that I authored this text, I have forgotten portions of it. It was, afterall, a draft- written all in one month, with absolutely no consideration to revision or fixes as I went. And I haven’t picked it up since. So as I read today’s chapter, the words caught me as much by surprise as my first-time listeners poised at my feet.

Eighteen months ago, James and I were blissfully unaware of the cancer that had spread throughout his body. We were months away from knowing how limited our time together was; we were months away from knowing we weren’t in remission. It’s been nearly five months since the cancer took him and I am still falling to my knees, weeping from depths of sorrow I’ve never known, collapsing in the anguish of a life without him more often than I even admit to my therapist. Just this past week I have raged with grief and sobbed in my loneliness more days than not.

So today, as I began reading the chapter where my sea turtle is faced with the realization that her best friend might be gone for good, I heard the words on a far more intimate level. They were my words, not in that I had authored them, but in that today, they were meant for me to hear.

One day, while trying to nap in the sand at the bottom, a sea anemone spoke up.  “You should really try something new,” she said.  

“Are you talking to me?” I asked, looking around.

“Yes.  You are the saddest creature in this whole ocean, at least as far as I have seen.  I’ve seen you down here day after day just moping about.  I think you should try something new.  You’re in a rut.”

“A rut?  I’m in a rut?!  No, I’m at a loss!  I’ve lost my best friend, my only friend and I have no one else!  I don’t know where to find him!  I don’t know where to go or what to do!”

“It can be really horrible to lose someone we love,” she continued.  “I understand how you feel, but we can’t be sad forever.  There’s a whole huge ocean to explore!  There are more creatures to meet and new things to discover!”

“But I don’t want to do any of that without my friend!  What if he came back?  What if he returned and I wasn’t here waiting for him?”

“Do you think your friend would want to return to find out that you’ve been here, miserable this whole time?”

“Yes!  I mean, wait.  No. Was that a trick question?” I asked.

“It's not a trick.  Wherever your friend is, do you want him to be miserable?”

“No!  I would never want him to be miserable!  I would want him to be happy!”

“So,” she said calmly, “if your friend is someplace without you right now and you don’t want him to be miserable just because you aren’t there with him, don’t you think he would want the same for you?”

“Well, I guess so, but…”

“There is no ‘but’.  If he cares about you at all, like you care about him, he would never want you to be upset or moping about!  He would want you to be happy and enjoying your life!”

I sat there in the sand thinking about what she was saying.  In my mind, I could understand her point, but my heart still hurt so bad.  All I wanted was to be with Bumper!

“Have you known this friend your whole life?” she asked me.

“Yes, well, no.  I mean, I met him after I came to the ocean.”

“Were you happy before you met him?  Did you find any joy at all in the ocean before you knew this friend?”

“Yes," I answered somewhat reluctantly.  "I remember floating in the sun and loving how it felt on my back.  I liked to swim with the other hatchlings.  We used to have these races where we’d…”

“See?” she interrupted.  “You can be happy without your friend being right beside you.”

“But, but...but what if my friend is gone forever?” I asked hesitantly.  It was a truth I had been scared to admit, and one I had never uttered out loud until this moment.

“Ever the more reason to start finding some joy, don’t you think?”

The sea anemone didn’t say another word and neither did I.  I stayed at the bottom, only going up to take a breath or two, but for the rest of the afternoon and all through the night the words of the creature rang through my heart.  Wherever Bumper was, I would certainly want him to be happy, of that I was certain.  And if Bumper was, gone - gone forever gone - well, then he would always be gone and there was nothing I could do about that.

The next morning, I decided to set out and try exploring a new place.  Before I left, I thanked the sea anemone.  “Thank you, I am going to go explore for awhile.  I will probably come back just to check and see if Bumper returns, but I think I will take your advice and go.  Maybe he will be here when I get back.”

“Wherever you go,” she said, “your friend will always be with you, in your heart.”

It took every ounce of everything I had to not completely fall apart in front of my student audience. They knew I was struggling, and I admitted to them that it felt like these were words I needed to hear today.

I’m not ready, yet, to face this world without James. I am still so very deeply angry. It is going to take more than just encouraging words from a sea anemone to get me out the door on my path to finding joy. But, I heard him today. I heard my beloved talking to me. Neither of us had any idea when I wrote these words or when he read them that they would reverberate on such a deeply personal level for me a year and a half later. I pray, I beg more than pray, but I pray that he is someplace full of unimaginable joy. I know he would want the same for me, I do. But I wish, more than I have any reasonable, sane right to, that my story could turn out like the sea turtle’s. My class doesn’t yet know, but Finn and her best friend Bumper will be reunited before the end of this story.

I hope James and I are one day, too.

I’m not sure anymore, what I think heaven is like. I used to believe, really believe in all that the Bible said, but not anymore. My faith is convoluded at best and nonexistent at its worst. But today, today I had to believe that heaven was right here on earth. Not for me, I don’t mean to imply that today was my sort of heaven, I faced a lot of fears and cried a lot of tears today, but for James, I have to believe that perhaps he was right here today, making this his heaven for the moment.

The pile of brush from last fall was daunting. James barely had enough in him to clear the fallen trees, and so the pile that was normally neat and ready to burn was all but a mess. I had cleared it enough a month or so ago to make the drive to the barn passable, but this massive pile of branches and roots bothered my need-things-to-be-tidy self and so I spent more time in a yellow seat, scared to death of rolling the tractor – moving branches twice my height to a burn pile and clearing out the mess from last fall. To me, it meant facing my fears of the tractor, but to James’, well, this was precisely his kind of day.

With a high of 65 degrees, the sun felt magnificent today. I spent the entire time in the yellow seat talking with James. I needed him with me, to guide me, to help me, to calm my fears of the tractor tipping over. I needed him today. But I know that he would have relished the project. He would have loved the time on the tractor, the time clearing the brush out, the time making room for the compost and all that the garden will need in the upcoming weeks. He would have loved today. And so I did everything I could to love it for him.

Usually, we would have both been working near each other even if not on the same task, but today I had to deal with all the brush and then tackle the asparagus patches in the garden. We didn’t exactly prioritize the garden last fall, so the dead stalks, hollow pumpkins and all the supports and detrius from the harvest were still present. Heck, there are still carrots in the ground. Being in the garden without him feels like the worst sort of hell I can imagine. Second only, perhaps to being alone on the porch, the garden was a shared place of work; he had the tasks that he enjoyed and I had mine and together they made a beautiful, abundant garden. But today, while I kept an eye on the bonfire of branches, I weeded alone. Tackling only two of the raised beds, the road ahead to harvest is daunting at best, one that I’m not even sure I will engage fully in this year, but the asparagus and next the strawberries will bless me with their abundance with little effort on my part and so I dug my hands in the dirt and I sucked up the silence.

I feel stuck. I can look all around me and see this absolutely beautiful property, this amazing farm, this gorgeous home and I can be so full of anger. I don’t want it without him. I don’t want anything without him.

I sat on the porch for a while, my hands cut and bruised like his always were. I listened to the chickens and I watched Trudy in the yard and I looked out over all our dreams and I just cannot for the life of me feel the joy that we shared. I am just so pissed off. My words to the heavens are not kind. My prayers all went unanswered and I am left with nothing but heartache and sorrow. Sorrow so deep I fear it will consume me. I want you back. I want you here. I want our life back.

Today is the kind of day you and I loved the most. Warm temps, budding flowers, signs of spring everywhere, days like this felt like heaven. Whatever our to-do list, we would have spent the day together. They were my favorite kind of days. They were yours, too. Wherever you are, I hope it is heavenly. Truly, I hope so. But here, without you, it’s nothing short of hell.

My to do list isn’t even my own.  It’s really James’, but he isn’t here so it has become mine.  The things on the list -chores around the farm- would never have felt like chores to him.  They only feel that way to me for the emotional baggage that comes from each one.

I spent hours on his yellow seat moving brush from last year’s piles, hoping to get it burned down, but it was too wet to keep a flame.  

I cleaned the garage, a task I haven’t done since we said our vows, but one that was long overdue.  The end result speaks volumes to the path ahead: only one car needs to fit here; the potting bench has a new home with the shift in priorities; the cabinets repurposed for my needs. 

The day ended as all our days together did – sitting on the porch, soaking up the sun, listening to the birds, the frogs, the chickens, even the horses across the road.  

But the seat beside me is empty and my heart feels the same.  I’ve never known loneliness like this before.  The lack of companionship, the lack of conversation, the lack of shared moments.  

A year ago, on a day just like this, we sat here, he and I.  I can’t recall what tasks we crossed off the list that particular day, but I remember the tears that flowed as we sat here on the porch.  “What if this is our last spring together?” I wondered out loud.  We were only just beginning to grapple with the diagnosis then, but the concept felt inconceivable and terrifying.  

And yet, here I am.  Crying those same tears, sitting beside an empty chair trying to navigate the inconceivable, terrifying path ahead of me. 

Alone.

I lost my shit on a customer service rep today.  Lost.My.Shit. Demanded, in a voice that scared the dog, that she needed to put her supervisor on the phone.  Repeatedly.  Sternly.  When she said she understood my frustration I told her she couldn’t begin to understand my frustration. I was loud, I was adamant, I was pissed.  

I was very terse with the vet later this afternoon as well.  I spoke my mind mostly calmly but quite seriously about being kept waiting for over forty minutes for my appointment and eventually broke down in tears from her patronizing tone suggesting that I was doing a good job caring for a pet that must be very important to be, “given my recent loss.” 

My therapist should have been forewarned, I suppose, since my appointment with her came on the heels of my first couple of days back at school and then a day like this.  I completely lost it on her couch and only somewhat joked that she should bill my insurance double for this session. 

I don’t have it together.  I’m not even close.  I am angry every single day and my grief is tangible and agonizing.  I scream in the car, I cry at the grocery store, I fight the urge to throw things daily and I beg and beg and beg for his return.  

My whole life I have wanted one singular thing: to connect deeply with one other human being.  To know and be known.  I’ve never been one to have a large circle of friends or even to have a girlfriend or two with whom I share all my secrets. I’ve had my heart broken when I wrongly thought I had found the one to share such a connection with, and I struggled mightily during the years I was single, trying to make meaning of my life without someone that wanted a similar connection with me. 

And then came James.  I will never claim our marriage was perfect, but the connection between us was.  He was my truest and deepest friend.  And I am completely lost without him.  I look around me and see a life that I enjoyed because it was shared with him.  The tasks and hobbies around the farm we enjoyed doing because we did them together.  When I look ahead, I see no path, no direction, no way forward to joy, because he isn’t there.  I’ve lost my purpose.  I’ve lost the very thing that gave my life meaning and joy.  And there is no way to get that back. 

I was reassured by my aforementioned underpaid therapist today that it is not uncommon to have such an existential crisis in the midst of grief, but she also quickly acknowledged that simply knowing that doesn’t make it any less burdensome.  I told her I don’t even feel like myself.  I’m not at all the sort to speak to a customer service rep like I did today.  I’m definitely not one to visibly lose my temper after being kept waiting.  And I don’t generally cry in front of people but Lord knows that went by the wayside about a year ago. 

The little things that previously brought me enormous joy can never begin to fill the void of his loss.  The crocuses are blooming, the daylilies are sprouting, the chickens are all finally laying eggs again, but none of these blessed little things that we used to delight in do anything for me now.  She reminds me, this patient therapist of mine, that I am healing, and healing takes time.  I tell her how I feel self-absorbed, I feel irrational, I feel selfish and childish and weak.  She says I have to cut myself some slack, give myself grace and recognize that I am doing the very best I can.  But I don’t like this person that I am.  I don’t like feeling this lost, this hopeless, this angry, this lonely, this sad.  I just can’t seem to find a way back to the joy, I can’t find a way back to me.  Not yet, she reminds me.  Not yet.  Right now, she reminds me, I am drowning in grief.  Right now, I have to weather this storm.  

She definitely doesn’t get paid enough.

Outside my window the snow falls and falls.  A never ending sky of gray, never ending flakes of white.  Underneath the layers of winter lie hopeful shoots of green.  For want of spring. 

Outside my window the trees stand lifeless, leafless.  Waiting. No bud, no green, no leaves appear.  No sign of life or breath except the drip- drip of sweet water into pail. For want of spring. 

Outside my window the cranes call.  The goose, the wren, the finch. The wings in the air multiply.  Rising, falling, soaring. For want of spring. 

Inside my window, with gentle fingers, I push hardened seeds into pots.  Soil warmed by water and light, I will coddle and cajole until they open up, take root and grow.  For want of spring. 

But inside my heart a cold steady winter continues.  The ground of trust and hope and love remains frozen, forsaken. The dark outside world a hardened space. The horizon brings no joy.  For want of spring.

For want of spring. 

I will admit it, I was wallowing.  I was sitting at the counter crying.  I had just come in from being outside for the longest amount of time yet this season.  Trudy and I had done all our Sunday chores and we had been out with the chickens enjoying the sun.  Sitting in the adirondack chair on the porch, I had remembered a conversation James and I had last spring, when we first found out he was terminal.  “What if this is the last spring we have together?” we wondered that day side by side on the porch. It was so hard to even conceive then, but it feels just as hard even now in the reality of it. 

I was wallowing.  My tears were flowing and I was angry and frustrated and heartbroken that this was our “someday”.  This.  This beautiful home that he and I poured our dreams into; this amazing farm and all the creatures that live here with us; this Eden made together, perfectly suited to our way of life. But with a vacant seat next to me, it no longer feels like the dream we had been creating, it feels like a nightmare. This wasn’t a singular dream, but a shared one.  And none of it feels even remotely the same without him.

I was crying because there was no boiler in the turn-around, no taps in maple trees, no hoses filling buckets.  There had been no need for me to put all the sticks from the yard near the fire, no need for me to pull up a lawn chair and smell the sweet smoke as James made maple syrup. There were no boots on the porch column, propped up in relaxation.  No suggestion about whether we’d be snacking on chips and homemade salsa or bread with “dippy stuff.”  

And so I wallowed.  I felt sorry for myself.  I felt angry at the world on my own behalf.  I cursed cancer and the unfairness of life for taking him away from me, from here, from our dreams.  And I spoke with him as I sobbed, begging him to return, begging him to come back and live the rest of this dream with me.

And then I pulled myself together.  I dried my face and blew my nose and I sat back down.  I reminded myself that this is just a new chapter in my dream and I have had many new chapters before this – none nearly so hard, but still new chapters.  I thought back to the first time I had to reenvision my future – a time when I was divorcing my first husband.  The first time, perhaps that a dream didn’t go the way I thought it would.  I remember even as I tried then to create a new path forward, even as I studied and applied and got accepted to graduate school to pursue a Masters in Creative Writing, even that new dream never came to fruition due to a disagreement over custody.  “I have redefined and abandoned dreams before,” I reminded myself with soggy tissues in my fist.

I thought about the way my dreams were reshaped when I moved to Michigan. A risky move in the best of light, I uprooted my about-to-be middle school son and moved four states away from his father with no job and very little in savings.  It was a move that led me back to teaching though, it led me to a home with arched doorways and beautiful flower beds; it led Jacob to a debt-free college career and it eventually led me to James.  “I’ve done hard things before,” I told myself.  “And I did all of those alone, too.”

As I continued to sit, my breathing steadier now, my eyes dried and my focus narrowed, I thought more intently on all the ways my path has turned and detoured over the years and I heard the question rise in my gut, “What if…” What if my dreams had gone the way I had imagined them from the start?  What if my first marriage had lasted?  It might have been a life full of blessings, or sorrow, or indifference, we will never know, but I would never have had my years with James.  I would never have had this farm, this property, any property probably. “What if…” my mind continued.  What if I had gone to Bucknell for graduate school?  What if I had pursued my writing over twenty years ago?  I never would have been in the classroom.  I never would have had all these years with my students.  “What if…” continued to push my thinking, push my heart into crevices I hadn’t wanted to look at before.  What if James was sitting right here?  What if he was with me, on the bar stools at the counter.  What if he could talk to me right now, what would he say to me? He might say, “It’s circus money,” a phrase we picked up from the movie, “We Bought a Zoo.” What if the money he left isn’t just there to pad my retirement, or to help me manage the farm?  What if some of the money is for my next dream? 

The truth is, I don’t know what the future holds and if my time at the counter wallowing and questioning today is worth anything, it’s a good reminder that my plans don’t often go the way I intend them to. 

But, I was reminded today that my story does not yet have an ending, I am simply turning a page to a new chapter.  And if I know anything from these past experiences, it’s that I can trust the next chapter.  I can trust that it will turn out okay, and not only that it will turn out okay, but that it will be full of joy and blessings.  I can trust from my experiences that it will continue to make me feel more like myself every step of the way.  I can trust whatever direction I pursue it’s a path that will use my talents and passions and it will push me forward into new adventures.  

I can trust the next chapter and everything that comes with it because I am the author.

A year ago today, Valentine’s Day, James and I were working through a disagreement.  No different than any other couple in a long-term relationship, we seemed to always return to one central issue when we fought, and the days prior had been spent trying to create a way through and forward.  School was off for the day, but I would have been off work anyway as we had a routine follow-up at U of M with the surgeon who had performed James’ ear surgery the previous June.  It wasn’t the first routine follow-up check, but it would prove to be the last.  Nothing was routine after that. 

But the truth is, I wasn’t there.  We were still sore with each other and I knew his retreat into silence would make four hours in the car feel like an eternity.  So I stayed home and he went to see Dr. McLean.  And for the life of me, I may never forgive myself for not being there beside him, holding his hand when the doctor said the words that would turn our world upside down once more, “How long have you had this lump?” Our fight went by the wayside in that instant, whether I was there or not, and our battle, as it always should be, became a fight of us against cancer, never us against each other.  

It’s been 365 days since we had an inkling there was a problem.  It would be a month after that when we would learn that it was terminal and, without treatment, our time left together was at most, perhaps a year.  We did everything we possibly could, tried every treatment they could give him and we got ten very short months out of it.  

Just a few days ago was the anniversary of the day I met James.  In the two months since he’s been gone, I’ve been through the holidays, our tenth anniversary, the anniversary of the day we met and today, the anniversary of when we learned the cancer was not contained.  I have cried, I have screamed, I have thrown things, I have buried my head under the pillows, I have regressed into silence and isolation and I have struggled to even get off my knees at times. 

But my grief, my sorrow, my anger, my fears are all deep and profound because of love.  Because of love.  Because of deep and profound love.

And so, today, instead of dwelling on my regrets, or my loss, or his suffering, or his absence, today, I have intentionally set my sights on finding joy.  I sat with the hens and listened to their clucks and squawks.  I thanked them for the eggs I ate for breakfast and I fed them warm oatmeal for theirs. 

I slowed my pace walking near the flower beds and found crocuses inching up from the winter soil.  I watched Trudy run and run and run and I threw her football and we both basked in the unseasonable temperatures.  I found the cat sleeping in a ray of sunshine in the bedroom.  When I look around I see a beautiful, safe home.  I am blessed with friends and family and I have no worries of job loss or financial ruin. 

But most of all, today, and I hope for as many moments as I can hold tightly in my soul, I know that I have had the privilege of great love.  I have been blessed by and lived within and shall move forward with the strength and power and joy that comes from such a friendship, such a shared life and from a love as great as ours. I held his hands when we said our vows and I held them again when he drew his last breath. Love was there in the bar when we met and love was there in the room as I wept at his loss. But love remains still today. It has not ended, and even more importantly, it never will.  

Today, and always, love prevails.

It wasn’t easy talking with our financial advisor, making decisions about the money.  It’s our money, it’s your money.  It isn’t easy to make decisions and think about the future without talking with you, planning with you.  

It isn’t easy going to the store.  The list is so short, and the things that sound good are things you made for us and they sound so good because the memory is laced with visions of you standing in the kitchen preparing dinner, talking about our days.  The memories are also tainted with how difficult enjoying food became for you; the struggle to find something that wouldn’t cause you discomfort, the heartbreak at seeing a many who loved good food not able to enjoy any of it anymore.

It isn’t easy to be alone in this house.  I try to stay as busy as I can, but by evening, when the sun sets and the TV comes on, everything feels dark and empty.  Trudy goes outside and lays on her perch for hours.  “Yellowstone” might be the worst choice, but there isn’t a show on that doesn’t remind me of you.  

It isn’t easy to go to bed.  Another day spent without you, another night without you there.  I want to sleep, but I don’t want to wake as the mornings are so hard, the reality of your absence is tangible.

It hasn’t even been easy to be with friends.  They are our friends, afterall, and being with them punctuates your absence.  You were always there with me.  I miss seeing you across the table, or sitting next to me.  I miss when our house was filled with friends and you were there at the heart of it all.  They weren’t my friends, they weren’t yours, they were all ours. 

I miss our conversations. It isn’t easy to be all alone.   I am surrounded by friends and family and yet I’ve never felt so lonely.  I sat out on the porch today, on this beautiful, sunny winter day, with temps high above normal and thought of the hundreds of hours you and I have sat side by side in those chairs just talking.  There’s no one to talk with like that.  There’s no one to sit and dream with, to sit and reminisce with, to sit and savor the moments on the farm with.  

It isn’t easy to go to school and write plans knowing that I’ll return to work next month.  It isn’t easy to even picture trying to teach, trying to focus on the lessons and the kids and all that they need from me.  It isn’t easy to get in the car and come home to an empty house.  The realization that you aren’t just down at the barn or running to the hardware store hits hard every time I come up the drive.

And today, it sure isn’t easy to know that a dozen years ago I met you.  The night before the Super Bowl, you sat down beside me and changed my life forever.  I am, without a doubt, better for the time we spent together, but my god how I want more years.  

It isn’t easy to remain in this life, to live in the midst of our dream, to look out over our farm, from our porch and to know that it will never be what we had dreamt it to be anymore.  It isn’t easy to let that go, to accept that reality, to find any peace about it at all.  

I just want you to come back.  I want you to be here, with me.  I want our life back.  I want you back.  I don’t need it to be easy, I just need it to be together.